


an echo of inflicted evil

by lonelyghosts



Category: Homestuck
Genre: F/F, Implied/Referenced Sexual Harassment, Not Canon Compliant - The Homestuck Epilogues, Past Rape/Non-con, Post-Sburb (Homestuck), Repression, Self-Harm, Self-Worth Issues, Trans Female John Egbert, Unreliable Narrator, backsliding, butch lesbian jane, in the past, jane crocker rights, the condesce causing problems beyond the grave, the self harm isnt graphic but its there
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-17
Updated: 2020-02-10
Packaged: 2021-01-30 23:15:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,917
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21436282
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lonelyghosts/pseuds/lonelyghosts
Summary: After a careless remark by Roxy, Jane reinvents herself.
Relationships: Calliope & Jane Crocker, Calliope/Jane Crocker/Roxy Lalonde, Calliope/Roxy Lalonde, Jane Crocker & Roxy Lalonde, June Egbert/Jasprosesprite
Comments: 31
Kudos: 95
Collections: Jane Crocker Love Hours





	1. when i call myself a shell, i mean:

**Author's Note:**

  * For [dogexmachina](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dogexmachina/gifts).

> _Now do not misunderstand me;_   
_When I call myself a shell_   
_I mean- a used up bullet casing._   
_As in, the aftermath of something lethal._   
_As in, **an echo of inflicted evil.**_
> 
> are we ready for jane crocker angst hours??
> 
> title from a poem by amrita c.

Your name is Jane Crocker and only a few years ago, you and your friends saved the world. You are a goddess of life, but no one knows about that other than your friends. In the end, all of you decided it was best not to tell people, at least for a little while; to allow all of you to grow up in the ways that the Game denied you.

You have hobbies. You help out around the house when you visit your Dad. You volunteer as an EMT, as a way to discreetly use your life powers; it would be a shame to let them go to waste when you can help so many people. You like to read murder mysteries, and bake, and you enjoy playing pranks on people with your granddaughter and grandmother that is more like a sister to you than anything; that is to say, with June. You like listening to comedy podcasts and Netflix specials, and you like to play ARGs. .

You are enrolled in a local college, and you do not know what to study yet. You're considering going to culinary school, because you were always good at baking, and it’s very familiar to you- a soothing pastime. You like it when people enjoy the things you make.

You tell this to your friends one night. There are four of you- you, Dirk, Jake, and Roxy. You're all in the midst of doing some of what Dirk calls ‘that sweet shabu-shabu’, which you think is a dumb name for weed. When you tell them, Roxy laughs- loudly, unsteadily, the way she always does.

“Just be careful you don’t turn into that fish bitch Betty, Janey!”

All your blood turns to ice, and you manage a trembling smile that doesn’t crack. The four of you laugh away the comment, and for the rest of the night you can't stop thinking about those words.

You have never been under the belief that you are a perfect person, but you had thought you were good; but Roxy's words take you back, to those days of collar with a lock and no key, of red clothes and the simple hum of processing inside your head. 

You thought it was behind you; those days of blood and warmth and gold. It took you the better part of a year to truly reconcile with Jake for what you did under Crockertier, but these days the two of you get on fine.

What happened there, that wasn’t you, after all, he’d said, and you held onto it. That was the tiaratop; that was her, talking. It wasn’t you. It wasn’t.

But... wasn't it?

Wasn’t it you, hurting? Didn’t you want that? You wanted so much, you wanted that more than anything- you wanted them to pay attention to you. You were such a broken thing, back then, those five months of your father’s absence in your chest like a physical wound and no one who understood, five months in a session doomed from the beginning, five months of listening to the boy you thought you loved speak of nothing but Dirk, five months of Roxy joking and laughing her unsteady loud laugh as you trembled. Didn’t you want them to notice you, see your hurt like a lighthouse shining madly in the storm of your body? Didn’t you want them always to put you first?

_That wasn't Betty, Jane_, you think. _No, that was all you._

And aren’t you her great-granddaughter in all the ways that matter? Didn’t you grow up at her feet, wanting to be just like the woman who had already subjugated one planet and was working on a second? Didn’t you wear that tiaratop through the headaches because the thrumming red warmth of it felt, sometimes, like- and you want to vomit thinking it- her hands cradling your skull? Didn’t you feel lost those first few months? Didn’t she, too, have a slave-lover, the one she told you about- the man who helmed her ship, as old as centuries, who she broke through torture, whose friends she killed? Didn’t you want to do the same things to Jake?

And Janey, have you scrubbed yourself clean?

There are parts of you that are tainted by her, after all. If you don’t stop yourself, then what will you become? You want to be good, and if you’re not- you think the world of Roxy, of Dirk, of Jade and June and all the rest of the trolls, who you don't know that well- Jake, too, even if time has made you realize that you are far from romantically compatible with him, not in the least because you like girls instead.

You have to stop yourself. You have to turn yourself into something entirely alien from her, until there are no parts of you that someone could find the Condesce in.

* * *

You make a catalogue of yourself, of the parts of yourself considered acceptable- what needs to be shed from your skin, cut and carved out like the rot of an infection. You have been a doctor of a sort, and this is a quarantine, a surgery. 

The first thing that comes to mind is baking.

The Condesce loved baking. She was able to build a brand off of it, after all; baking was her in, the way she made herself seem entirely human. And that makes sense, because what she made was good- it tasted sweet, it tasted gentle, it was grandmotherly and caring, and it was a deception. She managed to wriggle her way into people’s hearts and minds and then she planted her roots there and broke them from the inside out. 

She told you the story of the Psiioniic, you remember that from the Crockertier days. Who he was- a man who loved and followed a Sufferer, a revolutionary, a goldblood with psionic powers that could power the most powerful ship in the galaxy. And what she did to him- killed the man he followed and loved in a brutal public execution that lasted hours and forced him to watch, sold the woman who had been a mother to him into slavery, and then took him and put him in a ship like a glorified battery. 

Of course she never told the story like that. She talked about her sweet honeygrub boy, how he was so afraid of her at first, how he tried to hurt her but he was so weak; how she weaned him on her love over time, broke him first with violence and then with the softness of her touch. 

“I gave him presents just like he did to me,” she’d told you once, as if she were talking about a holiday or a seduction. “I had to, reelly. He gave me the world- the galaxy and its conquest. So I had the engineers program subroutines- to make him think he had his family with him, so he’d be docile. But first I gave him treats- drugs and the pike, to calm down. It’ll work with your buoy, too, guppy. Starve him first, then give him treats- cakes and baked things and the pike, till he asshoalciates you with good things.”

You stop baking. You throw all your pans and pots away. When Jake asks why you’ve stopped baking, you tell him you didn’t like doing it anymore. It’s not a lie- even just looking at the baked goods in the grocery store makes you feel sick.

* * *

Next are the suits.

You stopped wearing dresses when you came out to the others as a lesbian- femininity always hurt to enact upon yourself, and coming out as a lesbian made you realize that you’d never actually had crushes on the mustached men in your favorite TV shows- you didn’t want to be loved by them, you wanted to be them. 

But the suits-

You remember your dream of Crockercorp always seemed to include you wearing a bright red suit. And even if the Condesce had fun with femininity- her long mane of hair that almost seemed to be alive, the crown on her head, her painted nails and lips- she wore suits, too. That long, form-fitting black pantsuit. She wanted to be the boss, you are very sure of that- the CEO of the universe, copyright Her Imperial Condescenscion, signed HIC. She wanted to rule the world and run it like an enterprise, and you know that CEOs wear suits- it makes them look more powerful. 

And when you think about it, you feel more powerful in a suit too.

So you throw out all the tailored suits, and then you think about it for a second and throw away all your red clothing. You go through your apartment and find every single Crockercorp product that you’ve ever had and have not yet thrown away and then dump those for good measure. You start showing up in hoodies and sweatpants to things, buy a couple skirts for dress events even though it hurts your heart.

The first party you go to wearing a skirt, Rose loudly laments that she is the only butch lesbian there- “Jane, the sense of betrayal I feel is unmatched. In the absence of Vriska and Terezi I relied upon you for solidarity, and you repay me with a skirt?” It’s jokingly meant, of course, but it still hurts- you miss your suits and cardigans and slacks. But those are things that Betty loved too, and so you clench your teeth and laugh and turn the conversation to what crime Vriska and Terezi will commit on date night this week.

Rose looks at you with a strange sort of concern, but you know she would not understand, so when she asks you more seriously later why you’ve started wearing skirts, you say that it feels more freeing for your legs and leave it at that. And it’s not a lie, not really- knowing you are less and less your great-grandmother's tool is freeing in itself.

* * *

But not freeing enough.

Karkat wears a V-neck one day and you stop in your tracks at the sight of the edge of that small round white scar from when you impaled him. It peeks out, just barely, but it’s there, and it is a reminder of what you had forgotten.

How could you forget killing someone? You shoved that trident through his chest and yanked it back out and stared dispassionately down at the way blood streamed from it because it didn’t matter, did it? He could still be brought back. And you pulled him from the dirt with the blue shock of lightning that thrummed with Life and he was alive again; and you told him that such things were possible for you, that the very ebb and flow of Life was at your disposal. He was afraid of you, you think. 

And have you ever used your Life powers for good, really? You can’t think of a time. You barely remember the final battle, so if you used them there, then it didn’t count. It was in the heat of the moment, it was instinct, and instinct doesn’t count for anything. Instinct is a series of chemicals in your body. It is a trained response. It means nothing about whether or not you are like her.

But you are doing good with Life now, you remember. You’re saving people’s lives. You’re bringing them back to life, and that’s good- they are alive, and saving people is objectively good. The Condesce tossed people aside and killed them as sport. If ever she saved someone it was because she thought they were useful. 

Still, you decide, lines must be drawn. If you are repenting, then you deserve no thanks- you cannot stay with the patients after transporting them to the hospital. They might try and thank you, and your work is not something to be thanked. It is repentance.

As soon as you get people to the hospital, you get on the next call. You do not wait. And sometimes you wonder if the people you helped save ended up okay- sometimes the not-knowing eats at you inside- but perhaps that is the feeling of cutting out the rot. 

* * *

Next is comedy.

Netflix specials and jokes and pranks aren’t quite the same thing, but the Condesce liked to be funny too. She liked jokes, and pranks, and humor- even if your senses of what that entailed diverged wildly. She had her own personal jester, had an entire Church of Mirth that she surveyed- she had the priests perform regularly for her. And Betty had never sent you jokebooks, but she had told you later under Crockertier that “none of the jokes were finny!” She laughed at you a lot when you were Crockertier. It had not meant much back then. You had not cared.

Her moirail, who you gathered was the leader of the Church for a long time, offered up people to ‘perform’ for her. “If they weren’t finny enough, then I’d cull the beaches for not being good enough,” she told you. “Someday you’ll sea that all on your own, and I won’t need to kelp you." Back then, of course, you had not had any idea of humor, but now that you do, you feel sick that she could take even this from you.

You wonder if she would have liked pranks. You wonder how those pranks would have ended. 

You stop pranking June back when she pranks you. You stop watching comedy shows until Netflix stops recommending them. You stop reading jokebooks. You stop pranking other people. 

June asks you why you’ve stopped pranking her and you shrug. “I guess it stopped being funny to me,” you tell her, and the look on her face hurts, but you have to be clean. 

* * *

You toss your love for puzzles next. 

The Condesce loved your analytical thinking, how smart you were, how good you were, how helpful you could be. You roamed Derse with Jade and took apart schemes of the smallest revolution brick by brick- you and Jade broke Roxy's spirit- Jade through threats and you with implaceable offers of clemency that you know would not have been followed through on. You remember that Roxy would have been killed if she ever made the matriorb. You remember taking a mailbag from a postwoman full of letters to and from your father.

In the ways she used you, you were the brains and Jade was the brawn. Even though Jade has always been smarter than you, you suppose the Condesce had to find some sort of use for you, after all. She liked you, which is the worst part, and so maybe you weren't so much her tool as something cute and controllable for her. She maneuvered the two of you so well.

In the end you will never know what she thought of you.

All of this to say you cannot be hers ever again. If that means dulling yourself down until you are nothing at all, then you will do that. 

Dirk asks you why you left the discord server for the ARG the two of you play together. You tell him it got to be too hard for you, and when he furrows his brow and stares at you with the blank look of his shades, you keep your face steady until he lets it go.

* * *

You stop hanging out with Calliope. Playing with trollsonas used to be fun- an easy way to destress. Now all you can think of is the Condesce. The sharptooth smile of Jaynne Crocer looks too much like hers, and the curve of her horns, orange above black hair and gray skin. Even these superficial similarities make you upset. When they message you in concern, you tell them you’ve just been too busy lately, and then you will come by next time.

The next time they message you, you don't respond. You don't know how to explain what you don't want to become, and it's easier this way, anyways. 

You stop hanging out with Roxy and Jake. When you think about talking with them you think of the humming warmth of the tiaratop on your skull, the words you spoke to them- you can’t look them in the eye. Your answers to their texts get short, one-word, then one-syllable. You don’t know what to say anymore. 

You stop wearing glasses- you remember Betty Crocker’s old cats-eye nanny glasses all too well, their bright pink frames and how they never sat crooked on her face, even when she was splattered by blood on the ground with a sword through her chest, flapping the blue flag of Roxy's mask. You wear contacts instead. 

You wonder how long it’ll take for you to feel clean again.

* * *

Then after all this you move back in with your dad. 

You remember the stories that the Condesce told you about her mother- if you could call a giant horrorterror living under the sea with the ability to annihilate all of trollkind with a single glub a ‘mother’. “Everyfin started to go right with me as soon as I left her,” she told you. Maybe that’s the key- maybe you need to be reined in by someone, under your father’s watchful eye. 

The Condesce bent to no one, you remember that. She’d cull someone for stepping out of turn, for not bowing properly, for an out-of-context comment. She didn’t have anyone to rein her in- maybe that was the longevity of her lifespan, the way everyone faded to pale nothingness under her long eternal lifespan. You are immortal too, but you can raise your father from the dead long enough for the purge to stick.

(You wonder suddenly about immortality. What if the purging doesn’t work? You cannot go on like this, and no death would be considered Heroic, or Just- maybe if you do this long enough, if you try your best to purge yourself and it doesn’t take, would a sacrificial death be permanent? 

If it comes to that, you decide, then that is what you’ll do.)

So you move back in with your dad, in the house where you lived for most of your life- during an apocalypse, during a childhood of unintentional villainy. Here is where the evil in you was born, and here is where it will die.

* * *

You stop answering texts. You stop answering calls. You live with a sister who only resides at this house in name, who practically lives at her girlfriend's house instead. June barely spends time with you, preferring instead to pass her days playing pranks and watching bad movies with Jasprose. You think it is funny that just when June came out of her shell and started being happier, you retreated into yourself.

God, you are a piece of work, aren’t you? 

You’re jealous. You are a jealous bitch. You hate that June is able to be happy and in love with another girl, who cares for her even through the veneer of her pink-purple pranks and jokes. You hate that she’s happy and you hate yourself for hating that June is happy, because June- regardless of the fucked up familial connections between you- she is your sister, and she loves you. You hate yourself for hating June's happiness, because in the end, you love her, you do.

You hate that you resent Roxy for killing the Condesce. Maybe killing her would have cleansed you; maybe seeing her on the ground with a red trident through her chest would have been a balm of its own. Maybe it would have saved you. Instead you have to do this bit by bit brick by brick and you hate Roxy for doing this to you and you hate yourself for hating her, because you love Roxy more than anything.

You hate that you’re jealous of Roxy and Callie in equal measure- the two you loved so much but could never say anything to, who fell in love with each other and never gave you a second glance. You hate that when Roxy used to lean over and pass you a joint, your mouth would tingle with the knowledge that she’d touched it, like the stupidest middle school girl dreaming of indirect kissing. You hate that you used to dream of maybe making yours and Callie’s trollsonas kiss, like a pathetic little girl who can’t have what she wants in real life and so takes it in fiction. You hate that Calliope was everything to Roxy and you were not. You hate that Roxy was everything to Callie and you were not. You hate yourself for being jealous. You hate a lot of things, but you hate yourself most of all.

You are trying so hard to be good again, so why is it that you are so full of hate and hurt that tangles and aches; too big to fit in your chest, so large you feel entirely consumed by it? You are trying to be clean and instead you drip with dirt and rot and poison, so much that you hardly know where to begin anymore.

Some nights you lie awake and wonder how you will ever be clean.


	2. a used up bullet casing.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A series of missed/disregarded messages to Jane Crocker.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> crossed out lines are unsent messages

tiptoeGnostalgic [TG] began pestering gutsyGumshoe [GG]  
TG: hey janey! u missed movie night, are u okay???  
TG: i mean i would have skipped too if i knew dave and karkat were going to pick THOSE movies lmao  
TG: uve seemed pretty quiet lately  
TG: i worry abt u, u kno  
TG: <strike>i love u</strike>  
TG: <strike>i care abt u a lot</strike>  
TG: ur my best friend, u know that, right?  


* * *

TG: it was good to see u at the picnic!  
TG: <strike>even if u didnt stay long</strike>  
TG: <strike>are u going 2 stop wearing suits</strike>  
TG: <strike>i always thought u looked really cute in them</strike>  
TG: <strike>y didnt u talk 2 me or callie at the picnic????</strike>  
TG: see u at movie night?  


* * *

TG: <strike>hey at movie night u looked</strike>  
TG: <strike>have u been sleeping ok lately janey?</strike>  
TG: <strike>hey r u doing ok?</strike>  
TG: <strike>if ur dealing w smthing u can talk to me u kno that right??????</strike>  


* * *

TG: u missed movie night again  
TG: we were gonna watch legally blonde lmao  
TG: <strike>it wasn't the same without u</strike><strike>  
</strike>

* * *

<strike></strike>

TG: okay i mean this in the nicest way possible but wtf janey??  
TG: june says ur not doing pranks anymore???  
TG: u love pranks!  
TG: ur the prankmaster!!!!  
TG: (dont tell june i said that lmao)  
TG: <strike>she misses u too</strike>  
TG: <strike>jasprose misses u too even if she wont admit it</strike>  
TG: <strike>and i heard ur not taking as many emt shifts either??</strike>  
TG: <strike>dammit jane im scared abt you</strike>  
TG: <strike>callie is 2 they jst dk how to talk 2 u abt it</strike>  
TG: <strike>were all worried</strike>  


* * *

uranianUmbra [UU] began pestering gutsyGumshoe [GG]  
UU: hello jane! ^u^  
UU: i was wondering if yoU are perhaps overbooked?  
UU: yoU didn't show Up for oUr roleplaying session yesterday...  
UU: if yoU are overbooked, that is fine! worry not!  
UU: i woUld just like to know if we shoUld move oUr games to a different date!  
UU: <strike>i worry aboUt yoU yoU know</strike>  
UU: <strike>yoU haven't been responding to roxys texts lately</strike>  
UU: <strike>did we do someth</strike>  
UU: <strike>oh this is hopeless</strike>  


* * *

timaeusTestified [TT] began pestering gutsyGumshoe [GG]  
TT: Hey Jane.  
TT: I know you said you're not doin' the whole ARG thing anymore, so I told the Discord server you were on indefinite hiatus. Just in case you ever wanna come back to it.  
TT: They all say goodbye. Angelmod says you always had the best theories and were a fuckin' gift from above when it came to those puzzles, and you know fae is hardly prone to gushin'. Everyone says they miss you already.  
TT: We all miss you.  
TT: Not to get all up in my feelings in your inbox, but I'm no exception to the rule, here.  
TT: I miss you, Crocker.  
TT: Just drop us a line sometime. Let us know you're doin' all right.  


* * *

golgothasTerror [GT] began pestering gutsyGumshoe [GG]  
GT: Hello jane!  
GT: Wed all sure love your company for movie night on wednesday.  
GT: Well be watching one of your favorites… i wont spoil the surprise but im sure youll be entirely pleased by it!  
GT: All we need is your company, theres no need for you to bring any snacks or other confections.  
GT: <strike>Its only that we havent been seeing you around much of late</strike>  
GT: Just let us know my dear!  
GT: Wed all be positively over the moon to see you.  


* * *

TG: dirk said you quit the arg  
TG: the server wishes u the best he says  
TG: idk if u got his text  
TG: u didnt respond apparently  
TG: they miss u  
TG: <strike>we all miss u</strike>  
TG: <strike>so fucking much i miss u so fucking much janey</strike>  


* * *

ghostyTrickstress [GT] began pestering gutsyGumshoe [GG]  
GT: hey jane.  
GT: <strike>i know we don't talk about emotional stuff much but if you're having a hard time...</strike>  
GT: i know we didnt grow up together or anything. heck, instead we grew up with each other's ashes on the mantle!  
GT: <strike>but i want you to know that</strike>  
GT: <strike>you are still important to me</strike>  
GT: <strike>AUGH why is this so hard</strike>  
GT: but you are like a sister to me! and it really sucks to see you so unhappy.  
GT: i have been where you are, believe me!  
GT: i stopped caring about much of anything  
GT: pranks... being with my friends... doing any of the things that used to make me happy.  
GT: it really sucked! and i thought nothing really mattered any more.  
GT: that it would always suck forever!  
GT: <strike>and i know it is cliché but</strike>  
GT: but i was wrong.  
GT: i know that some of it was because i didnt know who i was, and because i hated being a boy  
GT: but a lot of it wasn't about that.  
GT: and i want you to know you aren't alone!  
GT: you don't have to feel like that!  
GT: we all want you to be okay.  
GT: so please just text us back, okay?  
GT: it doesn't have to be me! so long as you are okay i am happy.  
GT: but i'd be lying if i said i didn't miss you.  
GT: so please talk to us, jane?  
GT: we all just want you to be happy.

* * *

TG: jake said ur not baking anymore??  
TG: u 'dont like doing it anymore' or smth  
TG: u love baking!  
TG: ur the best at it and everyone knows it!  
TG: fuck not sending these messages u dont read them nyways  
TG: cmon just tell us whats wrong  
TG: this isnt funny anymore  
TG: it never was  
TG: i miss u jane  
TG: why wont u talk to me  
TG: is it bc of  
TG: wait  
TG: holy fuck is this bc of what i said  
TG: no more baking no more movie nights no more anything u like  
TG: fuck fuck fuck  
TG: im coming over  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> dw there is a happy ending to this! i love jane too much to not give her one. also i really have no idea how to write jake lmao


	3. the aftermath of something lethal

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It does not have to be like this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> me writing jane is just [projects about intrusive thoughts] [projects my fear that im the same as my abuser] [projects my anger about not getting closure] [projects my anxieties abt being an adult w/o really knowing what im doing] if you havent caught on yet. so. this is about as self-indulgent as it gets, folks...
> 
> tws: mentioned self-harm, mentioned relapse into an eating disorder, generally jane feeling really really awful about herself, discussion of roxy's crush on dirk and her actions regarding it, discussion of some past (canon) iffy sexual roleplay between two characters, and discussion of crockertier and what happened while under it, including mentioned threatened sexual assault. stay safe yall

Roxy Lalonde stands outside the front door of the Crocker household and she has never felt less brave.

She's done a lot of brave things in her time. At the age of sixteen, she started playing a game that ended the world, got sober, saw all her friends die, resurrected one of the loves of her life, and killed the millenias-old genocidal fish Empress responsible for the death of her mother and Earth's apocalypse. All of those should pale in comparison to opening the door with the key June lent her and walking inside to talk to Jane Crocker.

And yet.

Roxy shouldn't be this scared. She's real good at helping out her friends, after all, gotten to be a dab hand at it. She wasn't nearly this scared when June frantically texted her 'i think i might be a girl roxy!!' at 2 in the morning, having come to her as both a friend and a fellow trans woman. Jake still rambles on about his various issues to her, frequently enough that Kanaya seems to regard the pair of them as moirails. And Dirk... well, she and Dirk are about as close as close can be. 

But this is different.

If she's right, this is related to the Game- a topic none of them talk about as much anymore. Better yet, it's about the Condesce- a woman that Roxy hates, hates with a burning passion, and that she's beginning to understand Jane still has a complicated relationship with.

And on top of all that, like a sinister cherry on a bright pink poisoned sundae, it's her fault. If this is about what she said the last time they really hung out, then she's responsible for Jane having what looks to be a breakdown of the highest magnitude from all possible angles. Roxy doesn't know how to make up for a misstep this big. 

It doesn't help that she loves Jane more than she should.

Loving Calliope is as easy as breathing- the girl she brought back from the dead, who calls her dearest and darling and sweetheart, whose name she would have called into the void forever. Sometimes, Roxy looks at her and thinks the very stars aligned, winking in the night, to give them to each other, to let their hearts touch.

Loving Jane was harder.

It isn't now, of course- these days it's joke books and detective movies and making fun of Dirk and Jake and Ace Attorney games, the furrow of Jane's brow as she pieces together a puzzle. These days, loving Jane is dancing stupidly in the kitchen while laughing so hard that breath becomes an afterthought, holding on tight to her soft, warm arms and never wanting to let go. 

It's easy to forget how hard it used to be back when they were stupid teenagers, especially since none of them like to think back on that time of uncertainty and trauma and harsh words and bad decisions. Sometimes the Game could make them into their worst selves. It was hard, loving Jane back then.

Loving Jane was skepticism, a furrowed brow, hands thrown in the air in frustration as Roxy tried to get through to her, was long and fruitless arguments about her drinking habits- no, alcoholism, there's no sugarcoating it- and pining for a boy who wouldn't love Jane back or even give her the time of day, and the true face of a genocidal corporation that Jane defined herself around. 

Those had been the bad days, and during the Game there were a lot of bad days.

But it was also murder mystery stories and witty comments and safety- the knowledge that when she talked to Jane she didn't have to be a part of the world outside and all its dangers, just be with a girl who thought things were simple. And later, a girl who would fight for her, who would stand by her side and hold that red trident in the air in a way that meant protection instead of fear. 

She loved her then, at the end of the world. And Roxy Lalonde is many things, but she's not the kinda gal to fall out of love easy. And she's not someone who'll step out on Jane, not for anything- not then, and not now. 

It is this thought that makes her step forward and open up the door to Jane Crocker's house.

* * *

It turns out that Mr. Crocker is out at some sort of... business conference, she thinks? Roxy doesn't know. She hardly knows the man, really, which from what she's heard is a damn shame. June says that her Dad was where she got her wily prankstress skills, and she has also said that Jane's Dad is just about the same.

Speaking of which. Roxy takes the stairs to Jane's room slowly, runs her hand along the banister. It's a strange mess of clean and messy, considering. She's seen Dirk after his own meltdowns, and the apartment has always been a mess- crushed Orange Mountain Dew cans on the floor, discarded scraps of metal from robotic projects, bits of food stuck in the carpet that always stain. And she's been there to see the aftermath of Dave's need to clean his and Karkat's apartments- utterly pristine, not a single stray item on the floor, no matter how innocuous. 

Jane is a... mix between the extremes. There has been an obvious effort to clean up- some things have been brought to the trashcan, but others languish on the floor. The bottom half of the railing is dusty and the top half is pristine, and if she peers downstairs she can see half-washed plates in the sink. Like Jane started to clean but changed her mind halfway through.

She creeps across the hallway and comes to Jane's door. No light shines from underneath her door, and there's not a noise Roxy can hear. Roxy wonders if maybe she's sleeping, the way June was when Roxy burst into her room babbling about needing a key to Jane's house. For the second time tonight (the first being on the walk over here) she considers going back home and waiting till morning.

Instead, she presses onward and slowly opens the door to Jane's room, as quiet as she can manage, so as not to startle her. 

She fucks that one up spectacularly all on her own. At the slightest easing of the hinges, Jane, who is sitting on her bed lit only by the soft yellow halo of her desktop lamp, yelps and rolls off her old white ghost-patterned comforter in shock, landing haphazardly on the floor in a failed youth roll that Roxy would normally laugh at.

As it is, they can laugh about it later.

Roxy takes a step closer, drops to her knees so the two of them are eye-to-eye, and doesn't speak. She's too busy looking at Jane- Jane, whose hair is mussed from lying on a pillow, a mess of flyaway curls that tickle the nape of her neck, her glasses discarded, purpling bags under her too-blue eyes. Jane, wearing an old ratty nightgown and looking for all the world as if she hasn't slept since the last time Roxy saw her two weeks ago. She looks a wreck, and the urge to _help _burns in the hollow of Roxy's throat, the deep of her stomach.

She gets as far as "Hey, Janey," before Jane is blurting out words of her own.

"What are you _doing _here, Roxy?"

To be honest, she should have prepared for that question. She should have prepared for any questions at all, but because she is somewhat impulsive and ran over here at two in the morning instead of any of the many reasonable hours she could have done that, she's flying blind here. So instead of saying anything that might be tactful at all, Roxy just cuts to the heart of it.

"I'm staging an intervention!"

Hey, no one ever said she was a mistress of subtlety and tact. Jane stares up at her, utterly bewildered for a moment, and then her face just- shuts down, metaphorical shutters pulling down in her eyes. Roxy winces. Right now you're really screwing the pooch, Lalonde- you sound like a Lifetime movie or something. She tries a different tack. 

"Jane, we're worried about you-"

"Worried?" 

The flash of anger in Jane's voice cuts through Roxy's words, leaving her tongue useless in her mouth. The clenching of her fists is minute, but Roxy sees it- sees the way those short, clipped nails are still managing to leave white half-circles on her skin.

And just like that, the fire in Jane's eyes dims and she slumps back, flattening her hands into open palms. "I'm sorry," she sighs, and the exhaustion in her voice weighs down her shoulders and her voice. "I'm sure you've been worried. You're a good person, Roxy. Don't worry. I'll be back and better than ever soon enough."

Roxy wants more than anything to be relieved, but she's heard too many assurances from her friends that they are _fine, _really, they don't need help. They've all gotten good at it- Dirk, Jade, June, all of them. Now that she thinks about it, Jane has always been eager to deny her hurt until it overflowed out of her. She might have been the first of them to get good at it. 

"I didn't even realize how bad it was," Jane continues, eyes large and luminous. The words drift out of her mouth without her seeming to realize it. Her voice is breathless, tight, superficially light. "How much of me she'd touched, tainted, bruised. So much of me was broken."

Roxy stares at Jane. Her mouth forms around words once, twice, but discards them because what is she supposed to say to that? What is she supposed to say to the knowledge that one of the girls she loves thinks this little of herself? Roxy has never once hated being right as much as she does now. She wants to reach out and pull Jane tight and never ever let go.

Jane looks up at her- her open, hanging jaw, her wide eyes, her half-outstretched hand. Jane's bushy eyebrows furrow for a moment before her cheeks flush dark with embarrassment- apparently, she hadn't meant to say that out loud.

Something inside of her is all pain. A Heart player could sense it a mile away, but Roxy only needs to look at the clench of Jane's straight white teeth to see it, the set of her jaw, the slump of her shoulders as she curls in on herself. She knows this girl almost as well as she knows herself. 

"Don't look at me like that, Roxy. I didn't exactly want to tell you about this," Jane mutters. 

"And why not?" Roxy's voice breaks. She feels sixteen again, hurting for her friends and not knowing how to help. "You're-" _the girl I love, just as much as Calliope, the girl I would have done anything for, the first person I ever gave my heart to- _"my best friend. You can tell me anything, Jane. I never want you to feel alone."

Jane's face twists at those words. "I hate making you look at me like that, Roxy. I never wanted to disappoint you. Or worry you."

"Then why are you avoiding me?" Roxy bursts out. She's shaking now, her anger and fear and self-hatred quivering in her shoulders. "I _care _about you, Janey. God, you being here alone and so obviously in the middle of a self-hate spiral so bad you could give Dirk a run for his money? That's a nightmare straight out of a dreambubble. I want you to be happy-" 

"I don't know how to be happy!"

Jane almost shouts it. She's shaking too, worse than Roxy- her edges tremble, her fingers brown blurs. For the first time, Roxy notices that her arms are scratched up, as if someone dug short blunt nails into the soft flesh and didn't let go until up welled blood.

"What do I have, Roxy? Tell me, please. Everything I have, it's just another way I'm like _her_." Jane ticks off each item on her fingers, speaking fast and desperate. "Baking was hers. Games, puzzles- those are the things she wanted from me. I was supposed to be the brains. Comedy- oh, she was a real comedian, she was, she loved jokes and pranks and she liked making people _hurt _the same way I liked making people hurt, she thought it was funny. We wanted to be in control. We even share the same _Aspect_\- I can't be happy, not when everything that makes me happy first belonged to _her_!"

"But why does that matter?" Roxy asks, voice as soft and soothing as she can make it. "You're not her, you're not the Condesce. It doesn't matter if you like the same things-"

"Bull_shit._" When Jane swears, it hits with the same precision and intensity of a 40 caliber bullet shot straight from the barrel of an appearifier sniper rifle. "I am _just like my great-grandmother_, Roxy, and we all know it!"

The words strike her with enough force that Roxy reels backward- at the sheer conviction in Jane's voice and the premise of her words themselves.

She knew that what she'd said about Jane being like Betty was enough to hurt, even if she hadn't meant it. The Condesce ruined their world, their lives, their future- a comparison to her would be enough to make anyone flinch. But she'd never thought that Jane had _believed _it.

The idea that Jane- witty, intelligent, whip-smart Jane with a mean streak and a heart that has only ever wanted to be kind- would think that she is just like the fascist alien dictator that made their lives hell is enough to make Roxy's eyes wet with salt. It's so wrong, and yet somehow it's exactly what Jane thinks of herself.

Roxy can't help it. She moves forward and takes a hold of Jane's shoulders- gently, she knows her own strength- puts herself close enough to look Jane directly in the eyes. Jane shivers at the touch, confused, but she leans into it anyways. Her skin is so cold, but Roxy doesn't move away, just holds Jane close and tries to convey all the love she feels with only the touch of her skin.

How could she have let it get this bad? How could any of them have let it get this bad?

"Why would you think that, Jane?" she whispers, and the spell of silence is shattered.

Jane laughs, broken, and twists out of Roxy's arms. She stands, nightgown fluttering around her knees, and Roxy stares up at her- at the bags under her eyes, the shine on her cheeks of what she now realizes are dried teartracks, her messy hair, the self-hatred in her shoulders. She looks broken. 

"Because of course I'm just like her!" Jane shouts, and her voice might be raised but she sounds anything but angry. Each word breaks with sheer self-loathing. "The proof is all around us, in every birthday photo of me before sixteen, where I wear red dresses and smile and hold Crockercorp branded merchandise in each hand. Who else could I have become? She's been in my head since I was a child!"

"She _knew _I was hers, from the start. I was her granddaughter and her heiress and her legacy. I grew up with her products in my bedroom, I grew up with her name as my own- she was my grandmother, Roxy, how could I not have been touched by her? How could I have escaped it?"

"Even if I could have escaped her- not like this. No. I did things with her hands in my hair and in my head. I told you I would kill you. Jade and I, we told you we'd spill your guts on the floor and then we'd bring you back, again and again, you, _hurting_, until you gave in. I _terrorized _Jake, I told him I would make him give me children against his will- I just about told him I would _rape him _Roxy! Even if I didn't mean it, I said it! And I still can't figure out what it was that she made me feel and what was already there."

"I'm still like her, Roxy! Baking, and puzzles, and Life powers, and jokes, and detectives. All of it. I have to scrub her out, I have to get her out, I have to be okay again, I have to be safe the way you want me to be. I'm evil on the inside, I have her wires still in my head, and until I can rip them out I'm not safe, I'm not safe to be around."

Her hands come up to clench in her hair, pulling hard at the loose strands. "It's so hard, Roxy, it is, I don't know what is me anymore. I don't know if I can ever be angry again. Don't I deserve the hurt? I ruined everything. Don't I deserve to be ruined? Parts of me are so rotten and necrotic, and they have to be cut out for me to be safe again. I think of when I was angry and I don't know how to feel anymore- was I right to be mad? Was it allowed?"

"I can't be angry, never again," her words come out hitching and broken. Jane is crying now. Tears run fat and wet down her cheeks, staining the shoulders of her nightgown. "It never comes to anything but hurt. I was sixteen and my dad was _gone _and it was five months of being entirely and utterly alone, in a world that was broken and that I didn't think I could ever understand, with the girl I didn't know I loved sleeping on my couch and leaving your clothes on the floor, and the other girl I didn't know I loved never answering my messages, and boys in my Pesterchum talking about romance and each other and never anyone who wanted to ask how I was, full of hurt in my stupid stupid heart, rationing canned foods in my pantry and almost relapsing into the eating disorder that I worked so hard to get over, and fucking skeletons in my yard- and what the fuck did it all come to? She used all of it to hurt you. I'm wrong and selfish and bad for still feeling the ache and the anger. I'm so fucking stupid and awful for wanting to be good in a way that doesn't hurt. It's all wrong, Roxy, I'm all wrong and it all hurts-"

Jane is cut off by Roxy almost tackling her in a hug, wrapping her bony arms around her torso and pulling her close. Jane doesn't even struggle- she just collapses in the circle of Roxy's arms, burying her head against the ridge of Roxy's shoulder, her whole body shaking with deep sobs that wrench themselves out of somewhere deep in the hollow of Jane's chest, where they have been sitting there festering for weeks. With each one, Roxy sways Jane gently, rocking her back and forth.

They stand there for a few minutes, the room silent except for Roxy's soft shooshing and Jane's sobbing, muffled by Roxy's shoulder, until the sounds of tears become slower and less frequent and finally trail away to hiccups and deep breaths that shudder out against Roxy's skin. 

When Jane's final tears have dried on Roxy's shirt, she takes a step back and pulls Jane to sit next to her on the ghost-patterned comforter, squeezing Jane's hand as she sniffles, wiping at the tearstains that have left her cheeks puffy and flushed. Jane won't look her in the eyes. 

"Janey," she murmurs, soft, "I'm so sorry."

Jane starts to shake her head but Roxy keeps talking regardless. She refuses to let this be awkward or embarrassing or strange, the way she knows it can feel after letting out years-old bottled resentment to someone who didn't know about the way you were hurting. She did it to Rose once, about the way she hated her mother for the alcohol lying around the house for a twelve-year-old to find and drink and nearly ruin herself with, the dark side of Rose Lalonde's legacy, and afterwards she didn't speak to Rose for a week, too consumed by shame and embarrassment. 

She doesn't want that. Not with anyone. Certainly not with Jane. 

"I didn't know you were hurting this much, Jane," she says, and strokes Jane's black hair, so thin and fine compared to Roxy's thick frizz. "I'm sorry. I shoulda been there, I shoulda been better, I never shoulda said you were like her. Because you aren't. Not in the ways that matter."

"But I am, Roxy, don't you _get it_-" Jane protests, and Roxy shakes her head.

"Yeah, you can be shitty sometimes, Jane, because we're all shitty sometimes! But you're more than that, we're all more than that, and I don't want you or anybody else thinking that just because we fuck up and do shit that hurts people sometimes, we're as evil as that genocidal fish bitch. If anything, Jane, it's a testament to you and how fucking strong you are that you're still as good a person despite having been raised with her as your role model. The idea that you could be like her... it's fucked up and wrong. Even as a joke. And about the Crockertier stuff..."

Jane flinches when Roxy says those words, squeezes her hand tighter almost unconsciously, but it needs to be said. It does.

"I don't know if you're aware of this, but before the Game, I said and did some real fucked up stuff to Dirk. I knew he was gay- he told me when we were like eleven, right after we told each other we were trans- but I... I don't know what the hell I thought, but I thought he could love me back somehow. And I think part of it was my own gender issues, and part of it was that he was the only boy I thought would ever like me, but I hit on him all the damn time. I knew he wasn't exactly comfy with it, but I thought it was okay anyways. There's one thing I did that I'm real ashamed of now. I haven't told a lot of people about this cause just thinking about it now makes me feel sick to my stomach, but I think maybe you need to know."

Jane is shaking her head, but Roxy ploughs ahead anyways. She needs to say this- she's thought about it for a long time now, and she thinks maybe saying it out loud will be... some kind of relief, or penance. It's not doing any good locked up in her brain.

"Hal and I, we were close. I thought of him like a replacement Dirk most of the time. And sometimes... sometimes we'd roleplay. As me'n'Dirk. And sometimes those roleplays got kinda not safe for work, and I thought it was okay cause Dirk never really had to know, but I was still doin that with Hal, without tellin him, even though I was... usin him, in a way. It was fucked up of me, is what I'm saying."

"I've apologized to Dirk and to ARquius, and he says he forgives me but I still did that shit. And I was a tipsy sixteen-year-old girl with a crush, Jane, you were being mind-controlled into saying some of that shit. I don't care if those are thoughts you had- Dirk's got super messed up intrusive thoughts that he doesn't act on and hates himself for having. She made you say that shit. You weren't in control. It was her, not you, and none of this- _none of this is your fault. _You were sixteen. We were _all _sixteen and full of trauma. I'm not letting you hate yourself for it."

Jane isn't shaking her head anymore, and tears have started falling freely down her face, but she's still staring down at her hands, her shoulders slumped and uncertain. Roxy knows none of this can be fixed with just what she's saying. From what Jane said, this sounds like something that's been rooted deep inside her, hurting for a long, long time.

Roxy isn't a therapist. She can't make all of this be better in one night- she can't make all this better on her own at all. Her words might be helpful right now, but they won't be enough to make Jane 'all better' again, because Jane, like the rest of them, wasn't really okay in the first place. Love helps, and heals, but it can't make someone all better just like that. No matter how much Roxy wishes that it could.

She can't fix everything. But she can tell Jane the truth: that she loves her, and it's going to be okay. 

"Listen, sweetheart," she whispers, and wraps her arms around Jane again, holding her close. "I'm sorry, okay? I'm sorry we didn't see. I'm sorry that it hurts and I'm sorry that it feels unfixable right now. It's not. I promise you it's not. We all love you so much, Jane, _I _love you so much, Callie and I both love you so much, we want you to be okay. I promise you it will be okay."

Jane goes rigid in Roxy's arms before softening, collapsing in. She's crying a little, and Roxy is too, as she whispers anything that sounds right, anything that might help, all of her love to Jane, hoping that if she says it for long enough Jane might start to believe it.

They stay there for a long time, arms wrapped around each other. Roxy whispers things and Jane squeezes her tight and every so often says, "but maybe- what if-" and every time Roxy counters it with more of the truth- that Jane is loved, that it is going to be okay.

They fall asleep there, after a long time, and both of them dream of the other.

* * *

In the morning, they will wake, and Roxy will gently tell Jane that she's arranged a therapy session with someone who has helped so many of their friends with the trauma that lingers around them and never really goes away, and Jane will reluctantly acquiesce.

Roxy will make burnt pancakes and Jane will think about helping. Roxy will see how Jane looks at the cooking pans and then looks away. She will not pry. Recovery does not come easy. She, of all people, knows that.

The two of them will go to movie night together and no one will ask any questions, but they will all hug Jane with uncommon force, and tell her that they're glad she's okay. They will watch the Room, and Jane will forget herself briefly in laughter.

Dad will drive Jane to the therapy appointment, since she doesn't have a car of her own. He will tell her that he is so proud of her when he drops her off, will press her tightly to his chest and kiss the top of her forehead, and she will breathe in the pipesmoke smell of him. 

The therapy appointment will be quiet introductions, and Jane will feel awkward. She will wonder if going will actually do anything, but she will make another appointment because of the way Roxy had looked at her when she had said yes to therapy, and the way her Dad's voice had been thick with pride when he had dropped her off.

She will wonder if getting better for the sake of other people is really recovery, but Roxy will call her to ask how it went at that moment, and she will forget the thought entirely.

The movies will continue, and slowly Jane will decide to rejoin the Discord server. The others will welcome her back with open arms, and she will not tell them the truth about why she left, but Angelmod will figure it out, and fae will message Jane to say that fae's glad that she's doing better now. 

Jane will keep going back to therapy. It will take many sessions but eventually she will begin to be more amenable to it; she will begin to like the therapist with their soft voice and gentle, probing questions. Jane will start lingering at the hospital after shifts, no longer hating herself for the blue lightning that crackles along her arms and down her fingertips, and a mother will wrap her arms around Jane's waist and cry in thanks for the girl whose life she saved. 

She will stop avoiding the others; she will sit down with June and tell her about June Crocker, exchange stories and watch her archived comedy specials together, will rib June about her... eclectic fashion sense and prank her enough to get her back for her month of absence. She will sit down with Dirk and they will talk about intrusive thoughts, the visceral disgust and self-hatred that comes with each one. Dirk will make her a little bunny robot and Jane will put it on her bedside table and look at its red eyes every night before she goes to sleep. 

She will talk to Jake, for real this time, and both of them will cry and hug each other and let every bit of their hurt out and then Jane will go to therapy to work out the residual guilt that finds a way to take root in her lungs, will dig out each of its weeds and feel able to breathe again. 

Jane will start roleplaying with Calliope again. When it gets close to upsetting topics, Calliope changes the subject and Jane loves her for it. Callie will go suit-shopping with her. They will stroll through the aisles of the store together, Jane running her hand along the silk, and then she will see a red suit and freeze, thinking of things that she wants to forget. Callie will take hold of her arm and pull her away, will sit next to her on the bench outside the store and talk her down from a panic attack, and then they will go out for Chinese food and Calliope will make her laugh, and Jane will forget about the suit entirely.

Roxy will bake Jane cakes, and when Jane feels sick to look at them, she will start cooking instead; makes Jane beef burgundy and sears up steaks and fries up some stir fry. Every dish comes out tasting terrible, but Jane eats every bit. They will watch Parks and Recreation together and Roxy will tell Jane that she would look a thousand times better than Ron Swanson with that mustache, and Jane will blush, hit Roxy's arm playfully, call her a flatterer, but her heart will feel full to bursting. 

Jane will start replaying Ace Attorney with Roxy and Calliope, and cheer whenever Calliope- who's never played the games before- figures out the twist before it happens. The three of them will laugh at the quips and work through the puzzles and sigh over Franziska Von Karma's utter beauty.

They will finish the final case of the second game with aplomb, and Roxy will yell with pride, grab Calliope by the shoulders and kiss her on the mouth, and the jealousy will creep into Jane's heart and make her look away until she feels a gentle hand on her chin and Roxy will pull her in, kiss her softly, Calliope cheering in the background and asking for her turn, and Jane will ask if they mean it- truly- and they will say yes- and she will feel an urge to cry, an urge to say no, a voice saying she doesn't deserve it, but she will kiss Calliope anyways as Roxy nibbles at her neck, giggling, and she will feel like the happiest girl on Earth.

All that will come later, and it will be a hard road to get there. But for now, Jane curls around Roxy's body in her childhood bed and thinks that maybe she doesn't need to hurt to get better. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HELL YEAH its finished.... jane crocker rights


End file.
